MotoGP: Casey Stoner to Honda?

Rumors emanating from Italy via broadcast outlet Sportsmediaset.it are offering up the tantalizing notion that Casey Stoner has now signed for Honda for the 2011 MotoGP season, which if true, will certainly put paid to the past rumors that Stoner and Livio Suppo (ex-Ducati and now currently back at Honda as team manager) don’t get along.

If true, Ducati’s disappointment at losing their star may well be mitigated by the knowledge that the other three ‘aliens’, namely Valentino Rossi, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo’s contracts are likewise up as well at the end of this season. Rossi to Ducati perhaps?

The Italian GOAT (Greatest Of All Time) riding Italian Racing Red? An interesting notion for sure; and how would Jerry Burgess feel about that cataclysmic change? Perhaps Jorge Lorenzo might be a better fit at Ducati for 2011… without a doubt he’d love to have the Number 1 status within a team and the opportunity to come out from under Rossi’s considerable shadow.

And where would that leave Dani Pedrosa? To Yamaha?! Let’s watch with interest…

Casey Stoner’s rookie MotoGP season was spent on a Honda with the LCR team. LCR team boss Lucio Cecchinello, took a bold gamble to make a late entry into MotoGP with the young Stoner at the hand of the Honda RC211V in 2006.

This was after many racing seasons of collaboration in 125cc and 250cc GPs. For 2007, Cecchinello signed Carlos Checa to ride the new 800cc Honda in MotoGP while Stoner made his way to the Ducati GP team.

Casey Stoner (after his Rookie year on the Honda) says: "I’ve had a long and good relationship with Lucio, there is only one year I haven’t been with him since I came into grand prix racing. We came up through the ranks together and he helped me a lot in the beginning, and this year we had an opportunity to get into MotoGP."

"I like the LCR Honda team and it is kind of difficult to be leaving. We have done a good job this year and even though we’ve made some mistakes."

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